United States v. Wallace & Tiernan Co. et al. (336 U.S. 793)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided May 2, 1949 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 336 U.S. 793 · 69 S. Ct. 824
- Docket
- No. 416
- Argued
- March 29, 1949
- Decided
- May 2, 1949
- Term
- October Term 1948
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Black
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Vinson, Justice Burton, Justice R. H. Jackson, Justice Douglas, Justice Frankfurter, Justice Reed, Justice Black (wrote), Justice Rutledge, Justice Murphy
Opinion excerpt
Me. Justice Black delivered the opinion of the Court. The basic question here is whether the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures bars the United States from utilizing certain documentary evidence in this civil antitrust proceeding instituted in the United States District Court of Rhode Island. Subsidiary procedural questions involve the doctrine of res judicata We proceed at once to consideration of the important basic question since for reasons later given we reject the subsidiary res judicata contentions. First. Whether the Government has a right to utilize the documentary evidence in this civil proceeding can be best understood by an immediate reference to this Court’s holding in Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U. S. 385. Appellees here contend that the Silverthorne holding is a complete and permanent bar to the Government’s introduction of the documents as evidence, to the use of the documents to obtain other evidence, or for any other purpose. The facts in the Silverthorne case as found by this Court were these: The Silverthornes having been indicted were arrested at their homes early in the morning and detained in custody for some hours. While so detained Government officers “without a shadow of authority” went to the office of their company and made a clean sweep of all the books, papers and documents found there. “All the…
Excerpt of a 18,325-character opinion. The full text and citation network load in the interactive viewer above.